Professional Informatics in Support of Inclusive and Equitable Teaching Practices

该奖项的全部或部分资金来自《2021年美国救援计划法案》(公法117-2)。大学教师通常很少或根本没有收到关于他们的教学或教学策略的反馈。此外，STEM教室中明显的性别和种族差异表明了不平等和学习体验质量参差不齐的问题。这项研究项目旨在探索在教室中使用摄像头和麦克风等传感系统来收集关于教师如何教学的数据。然后，这些数据可以形成对教学实践的个性化反馈的基础。这一整体调查计划旨在重新构建个人信息学，即使用自我跟踪的数据来实现个人目标，作为专业信息学(Pro-I)，可以帮助STEM教师提高他们的技能，并通过这样做，创造更公平的学习体验。这样的改进尤其有希望增加那些在STEM学习领域参与人数不足的学生的STEM参与。这项研究也有可能有助于对在课堂上使用传感技术作为教学工具的总体理解，并提供有助于自我反省和提高的材料，可能会使许多教师受益。首席调查员寻求使用Pro-I技术来帮助STEM教师进一步发展他们的专业实践，以期在他们的本科课程中创造更公平的学习体验。对教师教学的普遍反馈来源，如果真的收到的话，都是基于人类的观察，而这些观察并不总是有很好的可扩展性。该项目旨在使用教室传感系统收集多模式数据，如运动模式、凝视、面部表情和音频，以提供教学行为的细微差别画面。由此产生的数据将成为多模式分析的基础，旨在帮助教师反思他们的教学实践，并得出可操作的改进见解。这项研究可以扩展现有的两项技术：基于计算机视觉的教室感知系统EduSense和处理和可视化多模式教室数据的分析管道Edulyze。该项目由三项研究组成。首先，将采访教师、学生和管理人员等教育利益相关者，了解他们对Pro-I数据和系统的隐私、代理和采用的看法。其次，课堂数据将通过EduSense收集，并通过Edulyze进行检查，特别关注分析如何影响教师的自我效能感和改进教学的动机。分析还将检查多模式课堂数据的数据可视化设计。第三，根据前两项研究的结果，将开发一个原型Pro-I系统并部署一个学期，以检查对结果分析的反思效果。这项研究有可能做出重要贡献：增加对隐私、代理和Pro-I系统的采用的理解，因为它们与课堂传感系统的伦理设计相关；Pro-I数据如何影响教师的自我效能感和改进教学的动机的经验证据；和Pro-I技术，旨在搭建教师对课堂数据的反思，作为进一步发展公平教学和学习的专业愿景的手段。该项目响应STEM教育博士后研究奖学金(STEM Ed PRF)计划，该计划旨在增强STEM、STEM教育、教育和相关学科的最近博士的研究知识、技能和实践，以推进他们从事基础和应用研究的准备，从而促进该领域知识的进步。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2).College instructors often receive little to no feedback about their teaching or teaching strategies. Moreover, stark gender and racial disparities in STEM classrooms point to issues of inequality and uneven quality of learning experiences. This research project is designed to explore the use of sensing systems such as cameras and microphones in classrooms to collect data about how instructors teach. That data can then form the basis for personalized feedback on teaching practices. This overall program of investigation aims to reframe personal informatics, the use of self-tracked data to achieve one’s goals, as professional informatics (Pro-I) that can help STEM instructors improve their craft and, in so doing, create more equitable learning experiences. Such improvements hold promise especially, to increase STEM participation among students who are underrepresented in their participation in STEM fields of study. This research also has the potential to contribute to a general understanding of the use of sensing technologies in classrooms as a teaching aid and provide materials that aid self-reflection and improvement that could benefit many faculty. The principal investigator seeks to use Pro-I technologies to help STEM instructors further develop their professional practice with a view towards creating more equitable learning experiences in their undergraduate courses. Prevalent sources of feedback to faculty about their teaching, if received at all, are based on human observations, which do not always scale well. This project is designed to use classroom sensing systems to collect multimodal data such as movement patterns, gaze, facial expressions, and audio to provide a nuanced picture of teaching behaviors. The resulting data will be the basis for multimodal analytics designed to help instructors reflect on their teaching practices and derive actionable insights for improvement. This research could extend two existing technologies: EduSense a computer-vision based classroom sensing system and Edulyze an analytics pipeline for processing and visualizing multimodal classroom data. This project is comprised of three studies. First, educational stakeholders such as instructors, students, and administrators will be interviewed about their perceptions of privacy, agency, and adoption of Pro-I data and systems. Second, classroom data will be collected through EduSense and examined through Edulyze with particular attention to how analyses influence instructors’ self-efficacy and motivation to improve their teaching. Analyses will also examine the design of data visualizations for multimodal classroom data. Third, based on the results of the first two studies, a prototype Pro-I system will be developed and deployed for a semester to examine the effects of reflecting on the resulting analyses. This research has the potential for important contributions: increased understanding of the perceptions of privacy, agency, and adoption of Pro-I systems as they relate to the ethical design of classroom sensing systems; empirical evidence of how Pro-I data can impact instructors’ self-efficacy and motivation to improve their teaching; and the Pro-I technology that is intended to scaffold instructor reflections about classroom data as a means to further develop professional vision for equitable teaching and learning.The project responds to the STEM Education Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (STEM Ed PRF) program that aims to enhance the research knowledge, skills, and practices of recent doctorates in STEM, STEM education, education, and related disciplines to advance their preparation to engage in fundamental and applied research that advances knowledge within the field.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.